Category: Globalization Project

NPR Story: Icelanders Protest Highway Construction as Disruptive to Elf Habitat

Yes, you read that right. Environmental groups and elf advocates have joined together to protest the construction of a mega highway in Iceland. In many parts of the world, the belief in mythological creatures is heavily imbedded in a deep respect for nature and the processes associated with development (such as urbanization and building of infrastructure) are often incompatible with these ways of life.

Full Story Here:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/12/24/256863444/highway-in-iceland-may-be-sidetracked-by-elves

Abuses colour Cambodia’s fight for land

Phnom Penh, Cambodia – Nearly three years ago, a few hundred small-scale cassava farmers migrated from a district on Cambodia’s eastern border to Kratie, a neighbouring province, where they heard there was farmland available in a village called Broma.

The move was not unusual in this predominantly rural country, where land tenure is shaky and poor farmers often uproot themselves for a chance at acquiring land.

“Villagers went there expecting to make their living from farming. They just wanted to survive,” explained Bun Sothea, 22, one of the migrants.

But what supposedly happened next was extraordinary. According to the Cambodian government, the villagers allegedly banded together into a separatist movement and decided to “secede” from the Southeast Asian nation.

This so-called secession culminated in a violent battle between villagers and security forces, in which soldiers shot and killed a 14-year-old girl who had been hiding underneath her house.

After the Khmer Rouge abolished private property and instituted forced communal farming, the country – which never had a strong tradition of land ownership in the first place – was left in economic shambles.

Six months later, a total of 14 people have now been prosecuted and convicted for spearheading the so-called Broma separatist movement, including Mam Sonando, an elderly French-Cambodian who owns one of the few independent radio stations here. He was sentenced earlier this month to 20 years in prison.

But rights groups, internationals observers, and the villagers themselves say that the “secessionist plot” is a convenient fiction manufactured by the Cambodian government to justify the death of the girl, Heng Chantha, during a forced eviction.

‘No evidence’

The farmland where the villagers had settled was on the edge of a 15,000-hectare plantation that the government had granted to an agroindustrial firm.

The company allegedly attempted to evict them starting in late 2011 so that it could plant rubber saplings. When villagers resisted, hundreds of police and soldiers sealed off the village and called in a helicopter for backup before storming in-and shooting Chantha in the process.

Both rights workers and villagers insist that arrested radio presenter Sonando did not even have a connection to the events in Broma, other than broadcasting stories about them on his radio station.

“This entire court case was just for hiding the death of the girl during the combat against villagers,” says Am Sam Ath, the technical supervisor for Licadho, a human rights group that campaigns against land grabs and forced evictions. “There is no actual evidence proving that there was an insurrection.”

Sam Ath, who was blocked from approaching the village on the day of the battle but was able to observe from a distance, said that 1,000 soldiers, police and military police officers had surrounded Broma in all directions. “They tied red cloths to their heads like they were about to go to war.”

Land tenure 

Although most outsiders still associate this Southeast Asian country with land mines, civil war, and the depredations of the Khmer Rouge regime, the biggest issue facing many Cambodians is one that gets little traction in the international media: land tenure.

After the Khmer Rouge abolished private property and instituted forced communal farming, the country – which never had a strong tradition of land ownership in the first place – was left in an economic shambles.

Although the ultra-Maoist regime was ousted in 1979, an additional decade of Vietnamese-backed Communist rule meant that private property rights were not re-established until the early 1990s.

Since then, despite a few high-profile land titling drives and the creation of the Land Law in 2001, many Cambodians still do not have titles to their homes or farmland, even if they have lived there for decades.

Meanwhile, in a bid to speed development, the government has sold off vast swathes of land to agribusinesses for large-scale farming. Most of these plantations, or other economic land concessions, are located in areas where smallholders had farmed rice or other crops for years.

Cambodia’s crackdown on land grab protests

According to Licadho, over 2.1 million hectares of land have been leased to corporations over the past 20 years, “transferred mostly from subsistence farmers into the hands of industrial agriculture firms”.

Another 1.9 million hectares have been leased to mining companies, meaning that private companies hold nearly a quarter of Cambodia’s land. The group estimates that 400,000 people have had their land grabbed, or are at risk of losing their land.

“The seriousness of Cambodia’s land problem cannot be overestimated,” says Rupert Abbott, Amnesty International’s researcher on Cambodia. “Tens of thousands of people are affected. Both urban and rural communities not only face losing their homes and livelihoods through forced evictions and land grabs, but are also threatened with harassment, arrest, legal action and violence for peacefully standing up for their rights.”

In a report published last month, Surya Subedi, the UN’s special rapporteur for human rights in Cambodia, wrote: “There are well documented, serious and widespread human rights violations associated with land concessions that need to be addressed through remediation.”

He said it was hard to see what benefits ordinary Cambodians had actually gained through the granting of concessions, which is often done with no transparency.

Country development 

The government has expressed regret for the death of Heng Chantha, but defends its land policies as necessary for the country’s economic development – and branded its critics in the West as hypocrites. In a scathing October 18 letter to a British peeress who had published an editorial critical of land issues in Cambodia, the country’s foreign ministry accused her of writing from a “comfortable sofa in London drinking cappuccino, if not martini”.

“Did the UK or Europe or America get to be industrialised nations by planting potatoes or raising sheep’s in their own backyard?” asked the ministry’s spokesman, Koy Kuong. “Perhaps you should read objectively your own country’s development history before preaching to other countries. Your development views are so condescending to us.”

But it seems clear that the issue of land rights is becoming ever more politically sensitive, as Prime Minister Hun Sen and his ruling Cambodian People’s Party face elections next year. And the frequent, occasionally violent land protests in the capital over the past two years are a major black eye for a government seeking to emphasise the development achievements of the past two decades.

In this environment, Hun Sen has vacillated between making concessions to some villagers while cracking down on the most vocal protesters, casting into sharp relief the government’s fear of broad-based discontent over its land policies. Under pressure, he put a moratorium on granting economic land concessions in May – although critics charged that a number of large plantations were grandfathered in.

Crueler than before

At the same time, the consequences for protesters who fall afoul of the government have been harsher than ever.

101 East: No Place like Home

After a violent eviction in January, 18 women and children from the Borei Keila neighborhood in Phnom Penh were detained without charge at a “social affairs centre” with a record of human rights abuses. Another group of female protesters from the Boeng Kak neighborhood were jailed for a month after a protest. Both communities had lost land to powerful companies aligned with the government.

A number of other land protesters across the country have also been harassed, summarily jailed, and even shot.

The villagers who had been living in Broma have now been forced to leave, with some going back to their hometowns, others migrating to Thailand to look for work, and others taking jobs as maids or cleaners. Six village residents were sentenced to prison terms alongside Mam Sonando, while another seven had sentences commuted after cooperating with prosecutors.

Sonando, whose trial uncovered no evidence that he was a secessionist, and who has already fallen ill multiple times while in detention, is now facing the possibility of living out his days in jail. “We will keep on appealing because he received injustice. He is innocent,” says his wife, Dinn Phannara.

Villager Sothea says she has been forced to leave behind her home and cassava farm. Her brother, Bun Ratha, a land campaigner who has been accused of masterminding the secessionist plot, is in hiding. If caught, he will be jailed for 30 years.

Source: Al Jazeera

B-BOVID’s unique agric model worth learning from – FAO’s Africa rep – See more at: http://www.myjoyonline.com/business/2015/january-29th/b-bovids-unique-agric-model-worth-learning-from-faos-africa-rep.php#sthash.Obw8T7Kk.dpuf

The Deputy Africa Regional Representative of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, Dr. Lamourdia Thiombiano, has commended B-BOVID, an agri-business company operating in Ghana’s Western Region for its innovative and unique agric model that seeks to promote sustainable agriculture, food security, and eliminate poverty amongst farmers.

He thus lauded the company’s profit-sharing component, stating that, “It is a difficult task for any businessman to share profit” and encouraged other businesses particularly in the agric sector, to consider the profit sharing model to improve farmers’ standards of living.

Dr. Thiombiano who is also Ghana’s Representative of the FAO gave the commendation when he visited B-BOVID to familiarize himself with the operations of the company and its various models adopted to make agriculture more attractive and dignifying.

The FAO country Director, who was awed by the model, said if such innovations and models are emulated and implemented on a large scale, agriculture cannot be classified as a “suffering or unpaid” sector but a sector with many opportunities for employment and wealth creation.

B-BOVID is committed to ensuring climate smart agriculture, food security and poverty alleviation which is in line with FAO’s agenda on sustainable agriculture policy.

Dr. Thiombiano mentioned that the FAO would soon establish Community Development centre aimed at giving integrated approach to farming adding, “the B-BOVID example is worth learning from”.

Mr. Issa Ouedraogo, Founder and Chief Executive of B-BOVID said it was worrying that farmers continue to swim in abject poverty despite their enormous contribution to the society.

He believes that the over 65 per cent of the African population who are farmers could have a successful lifestyle adding, “We all need to grow together”.

Mr. Ouedraogo said Ghana has a super weather and soil which should enable it to become food sufficient adding, “at B-BOVID, we use the power of business to solve social and environmental problems through innovation and technology in agriculture”.

B-BOVID’s model, which is the first of its kind in Ghana, runs an Palm oil and palm kernel oil mill, an ICT centre for agriculture which is the first in the country, alternative livelihood centre which is the largest in the country, agricultural mechanization centre which is the only one in Ghana’s Central and Western regions, agro-eco tourism and eco-garden (Garden of Eden), animal husbandry, poultry and aquaculture.

Other projects currently underway includes farmers shop, an organic supermarket and an organic restaurant.

Mr. Ouedraogo says the company is introducing farmers particularly the youth to a modern transformative and innovative agriculture that will transform subsistence farming to commercial farming in the communities.

The company also believes in impacting practical knowledge to rural communities to create wealth, jobs, and to entice more youth into agriculture to improve the socio-economic wellbeing of the rural communities.

B-BOVID’s social inclusive concept can be replicated across Ghana and the sub-region; and it is for this reason that B-BOVID’s concept was among the case stories during the launch of the Global Compact Network Ghana in 2014.

The award-winning company’s farm also serves as a demonstration center for those who wish to diversify agriculture especially for the rural communities and for those who wish to replicate the concept. Replicating and supporting this initiative will improve the livelihood of the rural poor since agriculture plays a crucial role in contributing to the major socio-economic development objectives; i.e food security, GDP growth, employment, improved nutrition and poverty alleviation.

Mr. Ouedraogo added that B-BOVID through its unique concept, has created jobs for over 3,000 households in various communities, and indirectly improved the livelihoods of over 12,000 farmers. He said farmers obtain agricultural inputs at subsidized rate whilst first hand practical knowledge is given to the youth and farmers in the rural areas.
– See more at: http://www.myjoyonline.com/business/2015/january-29th/b-bovids-unique-agric-model-worth-learning-from-faos-africa-rep.php#sthash.Obw8T7Kk.dpuf

Land Claim Could Halt South Africa Renewable Energy Project

(Bloomberg) — A land claim brought against South Africa’s largest sugar farmer threatens to stop a 1.1 billion rand ($90 million) renewable-energy project that will produce electricity by burning leftover cane leaves and tops.

Charl Senekal Suiker Trust, which has 5,000 hectares (12,355 acres) of irrigated cane land and is a grower for Tongaat Hulett Ltd., is part of a group that plans to build a 16.5 megawatt biomass facility in KwaZulu-Natal, according to a presentation on the National Energy Regulator of South Africa’s website. Talks to settle claims by four communities bordering part of his farm will take place on Friday, Charl Senekal, the white owner, said by phone on Wednesday.

The government of Africa’s most industrialized economy is promoting agriculture and providing access to land as part of redistribution policies to compensate black South Africans for the seizure of property under white-minority rule that ended in 1994. At the same time, the country is turning to renewable energy as it struggles to meet power demand after failing to invest in generation even as the government expanded supply to millions of households.

“The whole project can collapse if they don’t accept our offer,” Senekal said, declining to give details because they are private. “We’ve made a very reasonable proposal to the government and we hope that this will be successful. I am sure it will be accepted. It’s a great project.”
No Power

Work on the plant in Mkuze is scheduled to start in August if all the communities agree to the offer, with the first electricity to be produced 22 months later, Senekal said. It may create about 400 jobs, and the project will be able to repay its debt in eight years, he said. All four of the community groups need to support the plan for it to go ahead, he said. South Africa has a 24.3 percent unemployment rate.

The development must continue regardless of the outcome of the claim, Dumisani Myeni, chairman of Silwane Trust, established to handle the claims, said by phone from Mkuze. Community groups will be open to leasing the land should the claim succeed. The groups include the Myeni, Ngwenya and Zulu tribes.

“Most of the community doesn’t have power,” Myeni said. “The project will help. Senekal will just need to be a bit flexible. We definitely want to work with him and any developers who come here. We won’t chase anyone away from the land, we just want partnerships. We will reach agreements and work with them.”
Electricity Shortages

A claim against the land was dropped in November 2010 after studies commissioned by Senekal found the area had been occupied by whites since 1880, Johannesburg-based Beeld newspaper reported. The land claims office in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, didn’t immediately respond to e-mailed requests for comment it said on March 10 will take two weeks to be processed.

South Africa has raised 140 billion rand from private investors for 3,900 megawatts of power as part of a renewable energy program, President Jacob Zuma said on Feb. 13.

Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd., the state-owned utility that provides about 95 percent of the country’s electricity, has instituted rolling power cuts since November as part of plans to prevent a total collapse of the grid serving the continent’s second-biggest economy. The cuts have curbed production and forced businesses to shut doors at peak times.
High Probability

Eskom suspended four executives while the government starts an inquiry into the business, Chairman Zola Tsotsi said on Thursday. There’s a “very high probability” of blackouts Thursday evening, the utility said on its Twitter account.

Senekal’s trust will own 30 percent of the project, Building Energy Development Africa 3 SRL, a technical partner, a 51 percent stake, and local communities 2.5 percent, according to the presentation to regulators, dated February 2014. Cape Town-based H1 Capital (Pty) Ltd., a group of black investors, will hold the balance. The project will be 60 percent funded by debt and 40 percent equity.

“I dearly would like it to be one of my legacies,” said Senekal, whose farms produce about 360,000 metric tons of sugar a year. “It’s in the interests of the area, the province and the country that this power plant come off the ground.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Xola Potelwa in Johannesburg at xpotelwa@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Vernon Wessels at vwessels@bloomberg.net Emily Bowers

China to Battle GMO Crop Fear From Field to Dinner Table

Oct. 9 (Bloomberg) — The Chinese government is trying to convince Zhou Guangxiu that the corn in the congee she wants to feed her son is safe. That may not be easy.

Zhou, the owner of a recycling business in the northeast coastal city of Weihai, said one source of her concern was an anonymous article shared online by her friends that alleges genetically modified crops cause infertility in Asians, part of a U.S. ploy against China. She fears her 21-year-old son won’t have his own family if she feeds him the corn-meal porridge.

“I definitely won’t let my son eat it,” Zhou said by telephone. “It’s not just me. All our friends are worried. All the corn grown now is genetically modified.”

China, the world’s most-populous country and the biggest consumer of rice, soybeans and wheat, has begun a campaign to push genetically modified organisms as it seeks to expand food supplies. While no domestic grain crops are bioengineered, President Xi Jinping has endorsed the technology used to boost output everywhere from the Americas to Africa. China’s Ministry of Agriculture said Sept. 28 it would use media, seminars and street advertising to combat the perceived risks.

Meat consumption has surged in China as the economy expanded almost six-fold over the past decade and incomes rose. That led to an increase in livestock herds and demand for feed. The nation is already the biggest soybean buyer and will become the top corn importer by about 2020, the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates. Most of its overseas supplies are produced from seed genetically engineered to grow with certain traits, like killing pests or tolerating herbicides.
‘Controversial Views’

“There has been a lot of opposition against GMO in China not based on science, which, if left unchecked, can weaken government support for the development of biotechnology,” Li Qiang, chairman of Shanghai JC Intelligence Co., the country’s largest independent agriculture market researcher, said by telephone from Shanghai on Oct. 7. “The agriculture ministry probably feels compelled to do some education.”

Because the technology is new, “it’s reasonable that society should hold controversial views and doubts,” Xi told the Communist Party conference on rural works last December, the Beijing Evening News reported on Sept. 28. China should ensure biotechnology is safe and should not allow foreign companies to control the market for gene-modified products, he said.
‘Very Big Problem’

The concern among some Chinese consumers about genetically modified grains dovetails with broader worries about food safety. Fears have been fanned by high-profile incidents, including rice found with cancer-causing heavy metals; rat, fox and mink sold as mutton; cooking oil salvaged from sewers; and baby formula laced with chemicals. About 41 percent of Chinese consumers in a 2012 Pew Research Center survey considered food safety a “very big problem,” up from 12 percent in 2008.

The state-led campaign to promote GMOs comes at a time when meat has become a popular choice at meals, requiring more corn, wheat and soybeans to feed livestock. China is the world’s largest pork consumer, ranks second in chicken demand, and trails only the U.S. and Brazil in beef, USDA data show.

In December, the country announced a new food-security strategy that will allow “moderate” grain imports for feed, while maintaining self-sufficiency in wheat and rice, a break from previous policies to ensure the nation grows 95 percent of the corn, wheat and rice it needs, according to an April report by the USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service.
More Meat

Per-capita demand for corn more than doubled in the past two decades, according to Bloomberg Intelligence. Beef consumption in China, which the USDA estimates already raises and eats half the world’s pork, could surge by more than 70 percent from 2013 to 2030, Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. said Sept. 5.

China’s demand for corn and soybeans will continue to rise in line with economic growth, according to the USDA report in April. The economy, which has the world’s biggest meat industry, may expand 6.9 percent in 2016, more than twice as fast as the U.S., according to estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

The country imported 63 million metric tons of soybeans last year valued at $38 billion, accounting for more than 60 percent of global exports, customs data show. It also shipped in 3.3 million tons of corn, according to the data. Soybean purchases will climb to 96.9 million tons by about 2020, with corn reaching 16 million tons, according to a long-term projection made by the USDA in February.
U.S. Grains

Most of the soybeans and corn China imports are grown with engineered seeds, including those with built-in resistance to Monsanto Co.’s Roundup herbicide, Zhang Xiaoping, chief representative of the U.S. Soybean Export Council, said by telephone Sept. 30.

China’s biggest supplier is the U.S., where GMO crops account for 93 percent of all corn produced and 94 percent of soybeans, USDA data show. While the U.S. is the largest user, Brazil and Argentina sowed a combined 64.7 million hectares (160 million acres) of GMO corn, soybeans and cotton in 2013, with another 21.8 million hectares planted in India and Canada, according to the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications.

“China doesn’t have a choice when the top suppliers all employ the technology,” Zhang said.

Corn in China trades at almost three times the U.S. price. Futures for December delivery on the Chicago Board of Trade were down 0.4 percent at $3.4175 a bushel at 6:08 a.m. On the Dalian Commodity Exchange, the grain was at 2,342 yuan a ton, or about $9.70 a bushel.
Not Unique

Concern that GMO crops are unsafe isn’t unique to China. Only 27 countries planted genetically modified crops in 2013, ISAAA data show, and at least 60 have labeling requirements, including Japan, Brazil and the entire European Union. Surveys in the EU show opposition by consumers, who worry about risks such as human resistance to antibiotics and the development of so-called superweeds that are impervious to herbicides.

China approved strains of genetically modified rice and corn in 2009, saying at the time that mass-production will be allowed only after trial planting and public acceptance. Cotton is the only bioengineered crop widely grown.

Unlike the U.S., Brazil and Argentina, China doesn’t raise gene-altered food crops on a commercial scale, according to Huang Dafang, a researcher with Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and former member of the agriculture ministry’s biosafety committee. Instead, it only buys them, though the government has rejected some imports with unapproved traits, including an insect-repelling variety developed by Syngenta AG. Imports must be processed, mostly into animal feed and cooking oil, he said.
Consumer Concern

Even as the top leadership has approved the safety of domestically developed genetically modified corn and rice, they haven’t been cultivated outside labs, according to Huang. No one at China’s agriculture ministry replied to a request for comment sent by fax.

“The main reason for China’s slow adoption of biotech grain crops isn’t so much that the government is swayed by public opinions,” Shanghai JC Intelligence’s Li said. “It’s that China doesn’t have leading, marketable biotechnologies and is afraid of having the market controlled by foreign companies once commercialization is granted.”

Genetically modified foods currently available show no effect on human health among the populations where they’ve been approved and likely aren’t a risk, according to the World Health Organization.

That hasn’t prevented consumers from expressing concern about food safety. China Central Television reported illegal sales of unapproved GMO rice in supermarkets in central Hubei province, prompting a pledge by the government that it would crack down on illegal growing and selling.

“We don’t know what GMO is and what it really does to our bodies,” said Zhou, the mother in Weihai who expressed fear of feeding her son corn porridge. “Hopefully, the government can help us understand what the truth really is.”

To contact Bloomberg News staff for this story: William Bi in Beijing at wbi@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Ramsey Al-Rikabi at ralrikabi@bloomberg.net Sungwoo Park

China Joins the International Finance Community

One thing I find useful for seeing the global political economy at work is look at The Economist as often as possible — sure, it has a very strong pro-liberal state narrative, but it can be seen as the publication in which one can read the regime of truths that the liberal state is espousing at the time. I came across this article within their website.

In the article, The Economist is praising China’s efforts to put forth a development bank to a certain extent. On one hand, the correspondent supports the better use of their savings, but China is basically throwing away their money by following, to use McMichael’s language, The Development Project by issuing loans to Venezuela, for example, who ended up just “wasting the money,” according to this author. What is interesting is that in this example of The Economist, we see the push for China to use these development loans, instead, by “hewing closer to the model of the Bretton Woods institution…” That, I feel, is a strong statement. Essentially, it is calling for China to jump on board to the “Globalization Project.”

China’s emergence into the development lending provides insight into what could be China’s pathway into either resurrecting the Development Project or perhaps into a quasi-privatization in which they are allowed to enter another country’s economy for resource extraction for their gain. In the case of Venezuela, China does have a interest in energy, so they probably expect to give up some of their oil resources to the thirsty Chinese economy — which looks like is already happening.